Author Topic: Let's Play Some Motherf*$&ing Games: 2010!!!!!!  (Read 364661 times)

Magetastic

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Re: Let's Play Some Motherf*$&ing Games: 2010!!!!!!
« Reply #800 on: February 14, 2010, 07:08:25 PM »
The Starsphere is awesome. Beck was getting murdered by limited weapon use (would it have killed them to drop another Hoistflamme?)

There are almost no ballistas for a while, but soon you'll be getting more than you'll ever need. There's a shop that sells every kind.
<%King_Meepdorah> roll 1d999 for "It was beauty...that killed the mage"?
* +Hatbot --> "King_Meepdorah rolls 1d999 for "It was beauty...that killed the mage"? and gets 999."12 [1d999=999]
<%King_Meepdorah> ...
<+superaway> ...Uh oh.
<+RandomConsonant> ...
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superaielman

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Re: Let's Play Some Motherf*$&ing Games: 2010!!!!!!
« Reply #801 on: February 14, 2010, 07:15:55 PM »
VP:DS- Done with the C ending path. The battle system is far less than it should be; the game has zero balance (see: Mages and plume skills) and the sin system feeds into this. You're encouraged to overkill enemies, but don't get much margin for error in terms of screwups. (No damage projections, can't hold back attacks). It was fun enough when it was SMASH late, but otherwise blah.

It's pretty much just a gaiden of the VP series, taking a look at the world a bit before the VP1 events. It's really cool for that, the game takes full advantage of VP1/2's style.  The story has it's moments, but by and large Wyl isn't connected to it. Half the time there is no reason for him to be in the scenes, and as a character he bounces from a random sociopath to the do gooder of the day.


Actually, lowering it's score to 3/10. What a waste.
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Re: Let's Play Some Motherf*$&ing Games: 2010!!!!!!
« Reply #802 on: February 14, 2010, 08:09:48 PM »
S.T.A.L.K.E.R.:Shadow of Chernobyl-Finally, finally beaten. Became the Arena Champion and just bought the awesome armor from Yantar again. Got the hardest ending to get. You know the one.

Well, let's see. On the good side, the game's atmosphere and setting is great. Actually going through Chernobyl and seeing the reactor that blew, and everything else in high realism gave the game a great sense of style. The constantly changing game areas made the game feel more like a living, breathing world. There are several portions in the game that are disturbing and in general the designers did a great job.

If only I could say so much for the programmers. The game is a buggy mess. Sidequests show up that you can't complete. Sidequests you ignore will randomly finish themselves and you'll get rewarded. Random catches of supplies will appear and disappear off the map. There are stealth mechanics that will never, ever work. For all the game has plenty of weird Anomalies (side-effects of the weird radiation going off in the Zone), the nefarious Crash to Desktop Anomaly is most present in the game. It crashes more than any other PC game I have ever played. All in all it made the game very frustrating at times.

The combat is heavily grounded in realism, which is a mixed blessing. On the one hand careful aim and clever thinking can reward you well early. I took out a troop of military people with good armor and assault rifles with nothing but a jacket and a pistol. On the other hand, have trouble pulling off headshots? This game will make you cry. It's not so bad when all you're fighting is Bandits, but for the last 3rd of the game you're up against mercenaries and Monolith faction members with military exoskeletons that absorb bullets like raindrops. Weapons jam at the drop at the hat, which is a nice touch for realism, but incredibly frustrating when you've fought off an entire group and a unlucky jam lets the last guy pump your face full of lead. There's stuff like hunger mechanics and bandages to stop blood flow but all that really does is make you waste time in the inventory screen.

The story is nonsense with easily predictable cliches and no real narrative. You're some guy with amnesia and all you have with you is a photo of a person that you're supposed to kill. And....everybody acts weird when you ask about his whereabouts. HMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM

So...I guess if I had to give it a rating I'd say 6/10. For all it's flaws it did try something different and unique, and I think if they devoted more time to debugging and playtesting it could have been a great game. But it's still bogged down by myriad flaws.

Next up...I dunno, guess I'll try to get back into KotoR and see how that goes.
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Crystalgate

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Re: Let's Play Some Motherf*$&ing Games: 2010!!!!!!
« Reply #803 on: February 14, 2010, 09:56:41 PM »
Dragon Warrior III: Time to sweep trough all towns in world 2 and get everything useful.

While not exactly useful, Lia does find Kandar. He's in a cell nonetheless, so someone figured out a way to bypass his "but thou must" defense. Lia reminds herself to find whoever arrested him and ask how he did that.

The Sun Stone, one of the needed items to reach Zoma is actually in the very first town of world 2 and a more throughout search allows the party to locate it. Two down and one to go. Lia also finds a flute next to a tree in another town. The flute isn't one of the big three items, but it's still needed for something. That should take care of the necessary items in towns. There's still the not needed, but still good though.

Lia gets the tip that she can find the Oricon and take it to a certain trader to be able to buy a Sword of Kings. She does that, but realizes that the Sword of Kings is near useless. It just happens to be so that in the very same town, she can also locate a Whip that's almost as strong as the sword and which hits a whole group of enemies.

The party also finds a good armor for Mye.

At this point Lia realizes she has a decision to make. She can let her companions change classes now that they have learned every useful spell they will ever learn with their current classes. However, as has been mentioned before, there's the danger that doing so will jeopardize her position as the most powerful member of her own party. Mye in particular is dangerous as she can end up with the same ability to heal as Lia has and the offensive power of a fighter. It was not to long ago Lia got the position as the most powerful one and she doesn't already want to give it up, so no deal. Her companions will have to do without class change.

Time to get the Crest, the last of the big three items. It's located in a tower.

The quirk of this tower is diamond shaped tiles which messes of Lia's orientation. When she tries to go north she will instead walk east or west and so on. Those tiles are usually placed above pits. While it sounds like the recipe for a lot of frustrating drops, this isn't the case. The brain numbing tiles will always change Lia's sense of orientation 90 degrees, so it's easy to control whether she will walk east/west or north/south and there's never a pit to both the longitude and the latitude. So, the party makes it up to the top without to much hassle.

At the top is a statue and using the flute causes the statue to change to a woman. She introduces herself as Rubiss, an elemental who created the world and thanks Lia for unsealing her. She also says that she will be even more grateful if Lia saves the world and then forks over the Crest. That's all items down.

Lia takes the three items to a shrine. A cleric there announces that sun and rain will become one and with a lot of music, the rainbow drop is created. With that in hand, Lia makes it to the spot where she's supposed to use it. She wonder what the rainbow drop will do, create a rainbow bridge maybe? Well, almost. It is a bridge alright, but instead of being made out of various colored and strangely solid lights, it's made out of wood. Lia can feel how someone's laughing at her, but she's unsure of whether it's Zoma or the various hint dropping townspeople.

In any case, the path to Zoma's castle is open and the party heads there. The first thing Lia does is to test if the outside spell works and it does. Confident that she can retreat whenever, Lia marches the party forwards towards glory. The glory is unfortunately cut short when a boss troll casts a spell which flings Mye all the way back to Lia's hometown.

Well, nothing to do but to retreat and fetch Mye again. Next time the party kills all boss trolls first.

NotMiki

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Re: Let's Play Some Motherf*$&ing Games: 2010!!!!!!
« Reply #804 on: February 14, 2010, 11:42:07 PM »
The story is nonsense with easily predictable cliches and no real narrative. You're some guy with amnesia and all you have with you is a photo of a person that you're supposed to kill. And....everybody acts weird when you ask about his whereabouts. HMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM

So...the game doesn't give you a mirror?
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Re: Let's Play Some Motherf*$&ing Games: 2010!!!!!!
« Reply #805 on: February 14, 2010, 11:48:27 PM »
No, actually. There's no mirrors in the entire game.
Don't think of it as a novel. Think of it as a chance to retroactively win every argument you have ever walked away from.

NotMiki

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Re: Let's Play Some Motherf*$&ing Games: 2010!!!!!!
« Reply #806 on: February 14, 2010, 11:54:45 PM »
Sounds like fun.  Even if it's predictable, I like it when games play with entertaining themes like that.  Devil Summoner 2 is kinda like that, too.  No huge shocker where things are going after a point, but the way they reveal the details has a lot of craft to it.
Rocky: you do know what an A-bomb is, right?
Bullwinkle: A-bomb is what some people call our show!
Rocky: I don't think that's very funny...
Bullwinkle: Neither do they, apparently!

Rozalia

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Re: Let's Play Some Motherf*$&ing Games: 2010!!!!!!
« Reply #807 on: February 15, 2010, 02:11:06 AM »
I'm sure that solved everything!  Case closed, boy, what a short game.

It would have if there wasn't TWO Red Capes! :o

Shin Megami Tensei: Devil Summoner: Raidou Kuzunoha vs. The Soulless Army - Red Cape gave before he died some info about Red Cape MK2, his location. The location in question is the factory Red Cape MK2 used to own which should have been the first place Raidou should have checked, but Raidou doesn't complain as he got some sweet demons in the process.

The factory is small, 4 rooms to be presise. Of course Shadow man appears saying it won't be that easy and it never is. Raidou must go through a maze collecting fetch quest items and if he feels like it save some poor sods, which he does of course. Shadow man also mentions for Raidou not to worry if he dies because he'll tend to Raidou's lady friend, with a laugh at the end to show he is totally not a rapist.
The Maze has a lot of blocked off areas and while somewhat dull is a good place for xp, oh yeah Red Cape MK3 showed up but he has no awesome scene with epic music and so is a nobody.

Anyway Raidou passes the "Maze" due to his skills in map making, a skill that has been in the Kuzunoha line for generations. With this he can finally open the door where Red Cape MK2 awaits. Red Cape tells Raidou he'll tell him everything before blowing some chunks and giving birth to some fat ghost thing.... Raidou Kuzunoha is NOT impressed. Knowing he can't scare his enemy the ghost flees leaving the Shadow man to make an appearance at last, but who could it be? HITLER!!! Na that would be silly its the mad monk Rasputin.
Rasputin explains what happened with Red Cape and the fat ghost thing before telling Raidou he most die of course, oh and its good being famous. Of course Rasputin is lazy so he sends a demon out in his place, Chernbog! Who wishs he was as impressive as in DDS2 as he sucks here.
Case closed and now Raidou must solve a case involving missing shipments belonging to the local shop. Sounds mundane but Raidou Kuzunoha is involved and thus it will be awesome.
   

Anthony Edward Stark

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Re: Let's Play Some Motherf*$&ing Games: 2010!!!!!!
« Reply #808 on: February 15, 2010, 03:53:43 AM »
Sounds like fun.  Even if it's predictable, I like it when games play with entertaining themes like that.  Devil Summoner 2 is kinda like that, too.  No huge shocker where things are going after a point, but the way they reveal the details has a lot of craft to it.

It reminds me of the robot fight in Monotoli Tower from EarthBound, where the robot dies when you take the battery out, but your PCs can't do it because there is no button to tell them to. Except that STALKER isn't a satire of jRPGs so it doesn't really work.

NotMiki

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Re: Let's Play Some Motherf*$&ing Games: 2010!!!!!!
« Reply #809 on: February 15, 2010, 04:47:35 AM »
That is a shame.  What games with obvious things need is 1) for the main character to figure things out with only a minimal lag from when you are able to, or 2) for the main character to have already figured it out before the player did and not to have let on, leading to a moment of badassery.
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DjinnAndTonic

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Re: Let's Play Some Motherf*$&ing Games: 2010!!!!!!
« Reply #810 on: February 15, 2010, 06:35:01 AM »
VP:DS- Done with the C ending path.
It's pretty much just a gaiden of the VP series, taking a look at the world a bit before the VP1 events. It's really cool for that, the game takes full advantage of VP1/2's style.  The story has it's moments, but by and large Wyl isn't connected to it. Half the time there is no reason for him to be in the scenes, and as a character he bounces from a random sociopath to the do gooder of the day.

The A Ending actually fills in Wyl's role a little more. WARNING, VPDS SPOILERS POSSIBLY!

If Wyl doesn't get around to actually killing anyone else with the Plume, then Ailyth and friends get mad, explaining that they put a lot of work into sewing the seeds of the whole war and leading Wyl to as many battles as possible to create the Angel Slayer. So, really, Wyl is the central feature of the whole war, and the forces of EBIL are pulling the strings for him. A Ending Wyl (the not-sociopath one) is understandably upset by this.

Since it came up in chat, I wanted to discuss VPDS and Wyl's seemingly misguided grudge against the Valkyrie. Now, obviously if you've played VP1 or 2, Wyl's hatred of the Valkyrie is pretty foolish, she had nothing to do with the death of his father (though arguably she is indirectly responsible for the death of his sister and his mother's insanity since she left behind the plume, but more on that later).

But in the time period/perspective of VPDS, we're not getting a Deity's point of view of the world. We're seeing Midgard from the common people a little more closely, with all the intrigue of the gods mostly hidden from view. Sure, everyone believes in the Gods and Asgard and Vahalla and all of that, but they very rarely come in contact with actual supernatural phenomenon. Even Mermaids and Dragons were somewhat rare in VP1.

Compare to modern-day religious people. There are many who strongly believe in the existence of God in some form or another, but there's a lot of disagreement on how exactly God works and behaves. The deities of VP are a lot easier to pin down as personalities, granted, but the common folk are still primarily going off of hearsay. Their parents told them the stories of the gods (probably slightly different stories depending on your family, too), and the only physical proof 95% of the population really has of their existence is the plume left on the corpse of the supposed Einherjar. Not everybody is Rufus, the half-elf chosen to be Odin's body double, or Lezard the mad genius top student of the magic academy, so the proof of deities is pretty lacking. But in VP1, we always got the impression that the common folk who were chosen to be Einherjar were pretty wise about how the Valkyrie worked. They knew the stories.

When I was playing VPDS, I remembered having a similar initial reaction - why the hell is Wyl pissed at Lenneth? So I kept searching for clues confirming that Wyl was an idiot. I kept waiting for someone to say "The Valkyrie doesn't kill people". Instead, I kept seeing the phrase "It is a great honor to be chosen to be with the Valkyrie". You know what this reminds me of? It sounds a lot like the things people say to comfort the families of soldiers who have 'died valiantly' in a war effort. And I'm sure it comforts the families of supposed Einherjar about as much as it does the real-world soldiers' families. Only the VP families are given a single deific figure to blame. Sure, some people probably see it as 'The Valkyrie takes those who have already fallen in battle'; but there are obviously some (Wyl's mother, Valmur's family) who have come to the conclusion that 'The Valkyrie -causes- those she chooses to fall in battle'. She is a -god- after all, it wouldn't be that big of a logical leap to make.

And, looking more specifically at Wyl, he is a child of his mother. Wyl was pretty young when his father died in battle, and from the moment the Plume was given to him, his mother began to rail against the gods, the Valkyrie, for taking him away. Raised in this kind of environment, with the only opposing sentiment being 'but your father's death was -honorable-', it's hardly surprising that Wyl developed the single-minded hatred for the Valkyrie that he displays in-game.

And in specifically C path, his sociopathic tendencies have been -cultivated- by Ailyth and Hel's influence. Wyl goes his entire life burdened by his broken family, with his insane mother's views drilled into his head, and his father's and sister's deaths causing a constantly-simmering anger to build up, and then one day, he dies in battle. But, his life is spared by (he thinks) a goddess telling him that he can finally get revenge on the Valkyrie - what he's ALWAYS wanted. He just has to hold up a feather. That's all. Sure, it'll kill someone, but that's all Wyl has to do, and she -did- just bring him back to life after all. First rule of persuasion, ask for a little bit at a time and people will eventually agree to anything. So Wyl and Ancel are in a tight spot later on, "hold up the feather! it's your only chance!" urges Hel. So he does, and hey, Ancel's stronger than ever! Maybe he'll be okay?

Well, Ancel dies. And even though Wyl didn't want to do it, he knows he's killed him. He's in shock, and grief, and he runs away from his comrades and anyone who would have (possibly) helped him. Well, they may have also killed him, but either way, he runs right into Ailyth, Hel's mouthpiece. Forget his father and sister, he's just killed his best friend, and he's not even able to begin grieving or dealing with his guilt when she tells him "it's okay little boy, it's not your fault. It -had- to happen. Think about your father, your sister, your anger." So she jumps him right into stage 2: Anger, and she keeps him there as long as it takes to get him to kill more people with the Plume. And now Wyl's stuck - he's already gone this far in, he KILLED Ancel (nevermind the circumstances behind that anymore), there's war all around him, and the Valkyrie is still out there, killing people and ruining families (as Wyl sees it anyway). What's a little more bloodshed when he can finally kill her?

The game doesn't explore all of this thoroughly with Wyl, but this is certainly where the story seemed to be pointing when I played the game. The individual intrigues along the way (except for perhaps Valmur/Phiona/Reinhilde/Auguste's story, which is where I gleaned most of Wyl's development in parallel, personally) are largely world-building. Though they do drop some subtle hints as to Ailyth's involvment in starting the war, which itself is just a side-story to Hel's plot to get Wyl to kill Lenneth.

A Ending, of course, would be the opposite for Wyl. Instead of getting mired in Ailyth's suggestions, he's strong-willed enough to look past Ancel's death and not inflict the Plume on anyone else. Personally, I find that kind of boring, as RPG heroes always seem to find this kind of strength, and I like Wyl as a misguided villain-type.

Back to C-path, Reinhilde and Auguste (and in some ways, their children) are interesting foils to Wyl. They are also suffering the loss of a son, who has the infamous Valkyrie plume left behind on his corpse. Phiona adamantly asserts that this is an honor, while her parents just wish he was still alive. They would have -none- of their children go to war if they could help it, despite House Haughn being a military house. Eventually, this argument over the son's Einherjar-hood leads to the death of both children (or in B path, both parents), and the remaining family members decide to follow Wyl, who understands what it's like to lose family members both 'directly' and indirectly due to the Valkyrie's actions. After all, if Wyl's mother hadn't lost it due to blaming the Valkyrie all the time, Wyl's sister might still be alive. Just more impetus for Wyl to want to kill Lenneth.

The argument that came up in chat was that Wyl was emo and his motivation was stupid. While I agree that he's definitely emo (and melodramatic), his motivation is pretty solid, even if the game rarely touches on it directly. I honestly felt that if the game went out of its way to beat all of the above explanation into the player's face at every turn, it would have been worse than the 'lack of exploration' we got instead.

TranceHime

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Re: Let's Play Some Motherf*$&ing Games: 2010!!!!!!
« Reply #811 on: February 15, 2010, 02:13:12 PM »
Touhou Labyrinth

Just 'cause I brought it up in IRC, tier list I made somewhere else.

OMGWTFGDLK??? TIER
This is special and completely independent of the actual tier list.
Flandre (Borderline A-B)
Renko (B Tier)

S Tier
Reimu
Marisa
Yuugi
Rinnosuke
Mystia


A Tier
Chen
Kaguya
Ran
Shikieiki
Utsuho

Borderline A-B
Alice
Meiling
Orin
Yuyuko
Komachi
Yuka
Kanako
Maribel

B Tier
Pachery
Swacko
Aya
Eirin
Iku
Keine
Tenshi
Sanae
Nitori
Youmu

C Tier
Remilia
Sakuya Really generous, would be in REALLY SUCK TIER w/o Lunar Dial
Minoriko
Rumia
Yukari
Mokou
Suika

You Really Suck Tier
Cirno
Wriggle
Reisen

Justifications for Contented Positions

Sikieiki in A Tier
Why? Siki has monstrous magical damage, and isn't completely slow, to boot. However, her lowest delayed spell still has 6000 delay, and costs a whopping 240~ish MP on Siki resources! Everything else costs around 8500. Which isn't very reassuring. Flandre, who has debilitating delay on her attacks, have higher damage potential due to her superior ATK compared to Siki's MAG. Siki would probably leave A Tier limbo if her attacks came out faster and she had more resources. As it stands, though, she is staying there.

Rinnosuke in S Tier
Rhino is someone who generally most people use at offense. However, that is a great misconception. Hihiirokane Blade is a powerful, fairly quick ST attack, there's no denying that, but that's as far as his offensive prowess goes. His REAL use is to spam World-Shaking Military Rule against bosses to make everyone super-strong, and then proceed to tank the shit out of enemy attacks. His initial defensive stats MAY leave something to be desired, considering Tenshi and Yuugi exist, but that can easily be fixed with skill points. Rhino is just a very solid member all around ever since the time you get him.

Yukari in C Tier
Yukarin is a true one-trick pony on her own. All she can really do is give the party an extra turn. Without Chen and Ran in the same party, most of her attacks do dipshit in terms of damage. Now, this is excusable since you'd have either or in your party generally, but as a character in herself, she's not at all solid. Decent-ish stats, but her attacks are too quirky for what they are. Shikigami Ran+ is decent damage if the two are around, but if not, too bad. You basically need 3 people for 1 spot. >:S

Sanae > Minoriko
In response to some guy on another forum
Quote
How the hell does your Minoriko heal more than Sanae unless you've been giving Minoriko more skill points? This doesn't make any logical sense, it only shows you're being biased because there is no way Minoriko is going to heal more than Sanae without being given more skill points, the numbers disagree. Okay, going to concede that Mino's healing is faster, but what's she got other than that? Falling Leaves of Madness is solid offense but that is pretty much it. Sanae has Miracle Fruits AND a non-elemental row spell.

Suika in C Tier
Response to same guy
Quote
Actually Suika's HP is completely average and many people have the same HP growth as her and are just as good if not better at slugfesting, like, say, Youmu. Yeah, Suika has a nice buff. But if you need buffs to be an awesome slugfester, you will never be an awesome slugfester. Ever. Even Alice, who mainly focuses on multi-target attacks, can potentially do more damage than Suika when both are unbuffed. Screw that Suika HAS to use her buffs before you can legitimately compare her with someone who can't buff, that is intrinsically unfair because that means you are immediately gimping another character since they can't buff. She's terribly terribly average >_>
19:35:58 (trancehime) there's a specific spot in the game that's for item duping
19:36:14 (Sanae) o.o
19:39:11 (Sanae) I'd love to dupe a second trancehime.

Meeplelard

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Re: Let's Play Some Motherf*$&ing Games: 2010!!!!!!
« Reply #812 on: February 15, 2010, 08:18:08 PM »
FFTA2: COMPLETED! People want a full rant on it but fuck it, there's not enough TO rant about the game.  The fact that it lacks plot means that all I can really rave about is gameplay and there's really not much to say beyond this:

Take FFTA's gameplay.  Now alter interface and polish such that things are a lot more user friendly, add in two more races, tweak balance, make things a lot easier to work with in general, and you have the basic development system.  Laws are more "Follow them, you get special benefits and stuff that the enemy doesn't have, INCLUDING IN battle resurrection!  Break them, lose these benefits."  Really, that's all it was; if you break a law, you're at no disadvantageous standpoint compared to the enemy, you just lose whatever bonus factor (In Battle Revival + Whatever privilege of your choice) you had on the enemy...and some of those laws are so trivially easy to follow, they sometimes don't matter at all, be it cause its like "Don't use this race!" when its not part of your team, or "Don't use this element!" when you have at least 2 others to work with, etc.  The only bullshit laws are ones that rely on random factors, be it enemy actions or shit like "Don't miss!" and then suddenly you miss on a 99% HIT CHANCE in a game that doesn't let you have 100% hit on Damage moves >_<

I've said this in chat, but what I mean is this:
FFT, one of its best points was its general plot and how it was handled; the actual political stuff was handled well, characters were decently written (Hi Delita), and the fact that we saw the plot from like every Point of View Imaginable allowed you to know more or less exactly what was going on, outside of the stuff the game really wanted to keep a mystery for the sake of, you know, keeping some suspense or something.  Very few games actually managed this as well as FFT did.

FFTA2?  One of its strength its is lack of plot and the fact that its aware of it, and doesn't try to pretend it has one.  Seriously, you'd think there's a loose plot in there, but it isn't; its quite literally just "Luso and Friends and their zainy adventures in Ivalice!"  There's like 4 plot missions that actually are related, and they're related loosely so...the final boss was pretty much just kind of tossed in cause "By laws of RPG, you need some giant monstrosity to be a final boss."  This is the one point in the game where the game pretended to have plot, but really it didn't.  It was a nice change of pace that the game did NOT have an actual crisis or anything.

Seriously, no earth shattering plot, no "The entire infrastructure is collapsing in on itself!"type scenario...its quite literally just Luso and the gang, and the stuff they go through.  If they fail...Ivalice goes on, no one really notices, cause they're "Just another clan."  The giant monstrosity wasn't actually a threat to Ivalice, just something that threatened the team...and the game didn't try to hurl morality bullshit at you either...yeah, there really is no plot, so the fact that the game didn't try to pull any last minute "IVALICE WILL BE EATEN BY A GIANT VAGINA MONSTER!" monster nonsense last minute was nice.  It was more just "...we have one last obstacle in my way before I can go home? *sigh* Lets get this over with!"

Anyway, 8/10 game I guess; shocked it was as fun as it was.  Its too addicting to consider a replay cause god damn is it a major time investment.  Oh yeah, there's one last thing I have to hype before closing this "rant"...one very important thing that anyone whose played FFTA2 must agree with, lest they fail at life:

RANK HEAD EDITOR!!!!
[21:39] <+Mega_Mettaur> so Snow...
[21:39] <+Mega_Mettaur> Sonic Chaos
[21:39] <+Hello-NewAgeHipsterDojimaDee> That's -brilliant-.

[17:02] <+Tengu_Man> Raven is a better comic relief PC than A

Crystalgate

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Re: Let's Play Some Motherf*$&ing Games: 2010!!!!!!
« Reply #813 on: February 15, 2010, 10:01:31 PM »
Dragon Warrior III: Time to beat Zoma. Well, on their way to his castle, the party has another incident where Mye is blown away and they have to go back and get her. Fortunately, this is the last time it happens.

The first floor tries to waste one's time. It has a lot of stair which leads to a corridor which in turn just goes in a circle. Fortunately, Lia soon discovers that there doesn't seem to be anything down those stairs worth her time. She instead proceeds to the middle of the castle. There are a lot of statues. With foreboding voices, they announce that they guard Zoma's castle and comes to life. Lia and her party is thrust into a battle with monsters they have only encountered about fifty-eleven times already! Somehow they prevail over their foes.

Killing all statues opens a wall which leads to the throne room. The throne room is full of damaging terrain and somewhere in it are some stairs hidden. This could be painful, but a simple spell neutralizes terrain damage, so all it serves is to waste time.

Next big floor has those orientation turning diamond tiles. Again, it's not hard to navigate them. The floor after that is rather straightforward.

Down below that however is where things are happening. Lia spots her father, who somehow made it to this castle without the rainbow drop. Maybe he built a raft or just swam? Whatever it was, it must have been complicated since he needed more than fifteen years to get here. Well, he happened to be fighting the King Hydra just now, so the questions will have to wait.

Ortega's performance leaves other things to be desired. It starts well enough, the hydra attacks and Ortega dodges while counterattacking. However, after missing twice the hydra decides it doesn't have to put up with the whole having it's attacks dodged crap and instead spews out flames. Judging from the damage he takes, Ortega has no flame resist equipment on whatsoever. Despite now taking a lot of damage, he still blows a lot of valuable MP on attack spells. He does manage to cast one Healall, but the second times he tries it he has emptied his MP pool and the hydra takes the opportunity to finish him off.

When Lia makes it to him, the hydra is gone. Ortega is to wounded to even see Lia and can just tell her his final words. He asks Lia to find Lia and tell her that her wretched father failed to achieve peace. Lia still would have preferred if he told her why he didn't take a warp wing back home even once, but at least he admitted he didn't do  a very good job of being a father.

In the same floor Lia also finds a Sagerock, the most powerful treasure she ever seen.

Down another floor, the battles begins. The party encounters Zoma who reveals that they are standing on the sacrificial altar. He then summons the King Hydra who's apparently supposed to sacrifice them. Unfortunately for the hydra, he's now up against four guys who doesn't use a dumb strategy.

Next in the path are two monsters who calls themselves Bara-something. While there are two of them, they attack one at a time which doesn't work out to well for them. Only Zoma left.

Zoma wonders why Lia is so persistent in pursuing him. Lia wonder what reason she doesn't have. The final battle starts. The first thing Lia does is to use the Light Orb, which changes the music and apparently weakens him.

Lia who after acquiring the Ultimate Whip has the highest attack power serves as the main physical attacker with a few Thordains thrown in. Harl with his high speed is put on Sagerock duty. Mye also has healing duty and also cast Speedup whenever Zoma dispels all buffs and she doesn't need to heal. Seth was originally supposed to buff Lia and Harl, but Zoma likes to dispel far to often so instead he just spammed Blazemost. He actually ended up being the best damage dealer that way.

Between double acting, having powerful attacks and being able to dispel, Zoma could put up quite a resistance. However, the Sagerock and the fact that he lacks the ability to hose the party with a lucky confusion spell means he isn't even half the threat Baramos was. Down he goes.

Most big bad evils would now have said something in line of "as long as humans have evil in their hearts I will return". Zoma instead says "as long as there is light there will also be darkness" which seems a bit unfair. It's already bad enough when the big bad evil demands that all humans have to become 100% good, but if the only way to prevent world threatening demons from emerging is for everyone to become cruel and heartless, you can't even hypothetically win.

The castle collapses and the party find themselves in the cave of no magic. There are no enemies now though, so it's just to walk out. Daylight has returned and Lia decides to report that the threat is over to the only king in this world.

He proclaims Lia a hero, but then drops the bombshell. He says that he's saddened that the connection between the worlds are now broken. Wait a minute! Being trapped in this dull world was not what Lia signed up for! The king awards her the title of Loto and the guards blows into trumpets. Lia wonders if another demonking will show up and kill those guards, but apparently not. Everyone rejoices except for Lia who disappears. A lot of legends are spawned regarding where she went. The answer is however easy, although it doesn't make any sense.

Lia went to rest, probably while cursing her bad luck. When she woke up, she was back home for no explained reason. To make sure this wasn't just a dream, she goes to the dragon queen's castle. There is a pillar of light or something which will take a hero to the sky world. She couldn't enter before, but now she can which proves that her victory over Zoma wasn't just a dream. How this happened she doesn't know, but who cares?

Maybe she will explore the sky world and maybe she will find it within herself to allow her companions to class change.

Cotigo

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Re: Let's Play Some Motherf*$&ing Games: 2010!!!!!!
« Reply #814 on: February 15, 2010, 11:25:27 PM »
KotOR2:  On Nar Shadda.  On the brink of getting bored and not doing every sidequest OCD be damned.  However, now Atton is a Jedi.

<Obsidian Fanboyism>  You know, I'm really, really glad I played KotOR1.  The only other WRPG I've played start-to-finish before that was PS:T, and it had set my standards a little high.  Then I played KotOR1 and realized not every WRPG will have awesome characters.  But I liked it well enough for what it was, and most importantly it lowered my standards for KotOR2.

See, this was nice because when I found out Atton's backstory I don't think I would have been surprised at what a well developed and believable character he was.  Nor did I expect for him to say something that made me *completely* reevaluate his actions in earlier character-interaction cut scenes.  It turned him from a Han Solo clone to someone who is intentionally a Han Solo clone for his own purposes.

I think I have to use him in my main party from now on just because of that.

An aside, but my main complaint about 1 was that it tended too much toward an absolutist system of morality.  With 2 I was happy already because Kreia's existence alone was a step in the right direction.  Atton's backstory is a much larger one.  So, uh, hooray.  Good job Obsidian.  I still like you. maybe you can make fallout 3 sequel thing not suck but im not going to hedge bets on that or use proper punctuation why are you still reading this

</Obsidian fanboyism>
« Last Edit: February 15, 2010, 11:32:52 PM by Makkotah »

Bardiche

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Re: Let's Play Some Motherf*$&ing Games: 2010!!!!!!
« Reply #815 on: February 16, 2010, 12:24:22 AM »
Inspired by Crystal Gate's fun writeups I've started Dragon Quest V: Hand of the Heavenly Bride for the NDS (because 3 wasn't for the NDS, and I played 5 pre-DS but wanted to see if it's improved).

It is still nonsensical and yet fun. Dazzle is OP.

BaconForTheSoul

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Re: Let's Play Some Motherf*$&ing Games: 2010!!!!!!
« Reply #816 on: February 16, 2010, 01:39:59 AM »
Diablo 2 Hardcore:  This game is utterly boring and repetitive... but addicting.  Me and 2 others decided to do a hardcore run set on 8 players.  I was a Sorc, one was a werebear, and one was a warrior.  We smashed through everything on Normal and Nightmare.  Unfortunately, after a couple dozen Baal runs on nightmare with 400% magic find, we had absolute shit for items.  We got bored and moved onto hell.  Our dumbass warrior forgot that his resistances were not shit and he died to the first lightning enchanted boss we fought.

So... I lose half my health, half my mana (and regen) and 15% of my damage with him dead.  We also lose our best tank.  Kinda made things a pain.  Our druid eventually died when he accidentally switched off of wear bear form during a boss fight too... leaving my poor little 83 Sorc alone.  Sucks since I can't do anything more really.   Sooo...

Time for some FE8 hardcore mode!

Strago

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Re: Let's Play Some Motherf*$&ing Games: 2010!!!!!!
« Reply #817 on: February 16, 2010, 02:30:22 AM »
ME2:

Rad game. Garrus is the goddamn Batman, and I love it.

Hunter Sopko

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Re: Let's Play Some Motherf*$&ing Games: 2010!!!!!!
« Reply #818 on: February 16, 2010, 02:31:38 AM »
inFamous- Two story missions to go... but I can't freaking find the last two or three side missions for the Historic District. Also pissed that apparantly some of the Blast Shards are permenantly missable. How is 100% a Bronze Trophy again? Other than those and the Evil side trophies, just gotta finish off the stunts, 100 Bio-Leeched enemies and 100 High Fall Takedowns. I'll probably make my Evil side run the Hard playthrough.

Anthony Edward Stark

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Re: Let's Play Some Motherf*$&ing Games: 2010!!!!!!
« Reply #819 on: February 16, 2010, 02:55:15 AM »
ME2:

Rad game. Garrus is the goddamn Batman, and I love it.

"Archangel? That's just something the people have started calling me, for my good deeds."

Also I got to cross that bitch reporter the fuck out.

Niu

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Re: Let's Play Some Motherf*$&ing Games: 2010!!!!!!
« Reply #820 on: February 16, 2010, 03:21:15 AM »
RANK HEAD EDITOR!!!!

I second and third and fourth this.

Taishyr

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Re: Let's Play Some Motherf*$&ing Games: 2010!!!!!!
« Reply #821 on: February 16, 2010, 03:27:47 AM »
RANK HEAD EDITOR!!!!

I second and third and fourth this.
Fifthed and sixthed.

Magetastic

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Re: Let's Play Some Motherf*$&ing Games: 2010!!!!!!
« Reply #822 on: February 16, 2010, 04:33:28 AM »
RANK HEAD EDITOR!!!!

I second and third and fourth this.
Fifthed and sixthed.
Seventhed, eighthed, ninthed, tenthed...
<%King_Meepdorah> roll 1d999 for "It was beauty...that killed the mage"?
* +Hatbot --> "King_Meepdorah rolls 1d999 for "It was beauty...that killed the mage"? and gets 999."12 [1d999=999]
<%King_Meepdorah> ...
<+superaway> ...Uh oh.
<+RandomConsonant> ...
* +superaway shakes head.

Cotigo

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Re: Let's Play Some Motherf*$&ing Games: 2010!!!!!!
« Reply #823 on: February 16, 2010, 05:21:48 AM »
ME2:

Rad game. Garrus is the goddamn Batman, and I love it.

"Archangel? That's just something the people have started calling me, for my good deeds."

Also I got to cross that bitch reporter the fuck out.

Part of the fun of playing KotOR right now is that "The sooner I get done playing KotOR, I can play Mass Effect.  The sooner I get done playing Mass Effect, I can play ME2."

In other words, hate you strago

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Re: Let's Play Some Motherf*$&ing Games: 2010!!!!!!
« Reply #824 on: February 16, 2010, 05:29:17 AM »
Shin Megami Tensei: Devil Summoner: Raidou Kuzunoha vs. The Soulless Army - "BREAKING NEWS: BLACK CAPE DEFEATS RED CAPE!" was all over the local paper. Raidou is finally getting closer to the urban myth status he's always wanted.

His next case is finding the reason for some dissapearing shipments from the local store. Raidou knows if he doesn't do this then the store will close and then, where will he get his aphrodisiac bovines from?
He makes his way to the port to investigate and hears some of the new shipments have just vanished moments after he arrived on the scene. Who could have done this? Many would say a wizard but this Shin Megami Tensei: Devil Summoner: Raidou Kuzunoha vs. The Soulless Army so, a demon did.
Raidou is proven correct and after defeating Red Cape he fears nothing, so the chump demons are all dealt with easily. However to his shock he finds evidence pinning Rasputin to the scene of the crime but why does he want Raidou's aphrodisiac bovines? A question he'd have to ask the russian himself.

Raidou hears much of a man called Elfman who used to be a kind man but was now evil and killing people. Seeing the plot point in front of him he found that Elfman was dead and someone was disguised as him being evil. All this is found out about 3 miniutes after going off to investigate Elfman meaning, Raidou is a pretty awesome private eye.
Raidou enters the fake Elfman's home which happens to be a church to find the villain is infact Rasputin which was quite clear at this point.
The time has come for the totally bombastic boss fight with Rasputin... who transforms into Asmodeus! I kid, Why would he want to transform into that lame star ocean villain anyway. Rasputin begins by hiding in one of three giant Matroshka and daring Raidou to find him. An easy task to be sure, but it angers Rasputin who ups the ante by using the deadly arte of Megido.
Even this can't save him and Rasputin falls.... exploding!?! Raidou finds that Rasputin the mad monk is infact...... a terminator? Send from the future to stop the one man who can stop the evil robot masters no doubt. Raidou is confused as this presents a rather large question. Why would Rasputin a russian monk who is actually a terminator, want with his aphrodisiac bovines?
« Last Edit: February 16, 2010, 05:33:15 AM by Rozalia »